Finding 'x'

•My pledge to Tiny•

If I previously had any misconceptions about waking up in an alternate universe, I'd been thoroughly convinced otherwise. 

I'd never ran from the hostels to the main building as fast as I did that day.

I didn't bother with cleaning up, I just threw on the nearest clothes I could find, dumped all the contents of Alero's makeup-slash-jewelry box on her bed, placed the bag into the portable, metal container and vamoosed to the hag's office.

She was in the middle of a staff meeting when I barged in, she was about to scream profanities but when she saw the look on my face, her mouth snapped shut.

"Miss Adeoti. What brings you by?" She screeched instead, her voice on the verge of causing an earthquake, several teachers had to hurriedly plug their ears to save their poor eardrums but that was barely the weighty problem.

"There's bad news." I said without preamble and the tension in the air heightened to a new level.

"We'll get to it as soon as we're done with this meeting Miss Adeoti, kindly wait at the—"

"It has to be now. It's urgent!" I spat impatiently, raising the box higher for all to see. Mrs. Lawrence laughed nervously and looked to her right for something, I followed her gaze and it landed on the hot cop's.

"In that case then, Mr. Otabor and Miss Ruby will see what this is all about if you be so kind as to escort them to the lab?" Hot cop had already stood up and was marching towards me, venom voice joined him halfway. I returned my gaze to the hag to protest, but her desperate eyes pleaded with me. I gave a curt nod and left the room in long strides, ignoring the clueless members of the staff that shared perplexed looks.

I got as far as the reception before hot cop yanked me around to face him.

"What's going on?" He demanded, looking me straight in the eye. I snapped out out of his hold and met his eyes properly.

"You'll see," I replied and resumed my pace.

The rest of the journey was spent in tense silence.

The biology lab was deserted when she got there, I jammed the box on the tiled slab in the middle of the space and went to make sure that there were no eavesdroppers and the doors and windows were properly closed. 

I turned to the expectant glances of the two detectives.

"I got a gift," I began and pointed to the box I was currently as far away from as possible. Venom voice raised a brow as if to ask; 'and so?', hot cop eyed the box warily.

"We need to get it to a lab as fast as possible before it disintegrates. The next equation is on it," I finished and venom voice rolled her eyes in boredom.

"So tell me Sherlock Holmes, why would we want to take a paper to the lab? Do you even know anything at all?" She chuckled amusedly and hot cop stoned her a look.

Something about the way she talked nonchalantly made me flare up.

"It's not just a piece of paper Ruby. It's a piece of human skin and I might not be Sherlock Holmes but I know that this isn't a cause for amusement." She rolled her eyes and lazily inspected her fingers again. I wondered how someone so feather brained could be a certified detective.

I turned to hot cop to find him doing that staring thing again. I sighed in frustration.

"Are you going to keep staring or your going to call those bozos from the lab to check this out for clues? We're running out of time!"

Hot cop stared me down for a few more seconds before starting towards the direction of the box. I had no idea why he looked like I'd pissed him off.